Novice trying A/C compressor job

[Duke000088]

Hi -

The A/C compressor on my wife's 2002 Taco is about to seize up. It sounds like a garbage disposer and it is LOUD when the A/C kicks on.

I'm a novice wrench but I'm considering trying the swap on my own. But I'm concerned about a few points:
1) Do I need special disconnect tools for the A/C lines going into the compressor? I intend to have the system evac'd by a shop prior to starting.
2) Do I need to get some compressor oil to lubricate the o-rings for reassembly? Where do I find that stuff?
3) Do I need to take the P/S pump out? Or disconnect anything from the P/S? Do I need to worry about air getting into the P/S lines? Bleeding the steering?
4)***I'm totally lost on how to check and shim the magnetic clutch. The FSM shows a dial indicator being used but it appears to be checking runout... I can't figure out how to measure the gap??
5) I have a NAPA Kricket II belt tension gauge that I use on serpentine belts. Will this work for the Taco's belts during reassembly or do I need a different tool?

It all looks pretty tight up there... I'm concerned about access and actually getting that compressor OUT past all the obstacles. Man... Any guidance??

Thanks -

[steve604]

i just fixed mine last week. mine made some serious grinding noises for about a year.

i pulled the belt off and turned the pully by hand. i found that the pully was a little loose so i figured it was the bearing on the pulley behind the clutch. i replaced that bearing and it's nice and quiet now.

if you have a problem with the compressor itself then you've got alot more work to do to remove the whole thing.

if you want to give just the pulley bearing a try here is some step by step

-take the a/c belt off (you will need to pull the power steer belt first)
-there is a 10mm bolt holding the outer part of the clutch on. you will need to hold the pulley with a strap wrench or you could use a big set of channel locks like i did and gouge things up. when you remove the outer part of the clutch a washer/spacer/shim will fall out from between. it's pretty small.

-there is a snap ring that holds the pulley on the shaft. it's really tricky to get off because you don't have much space. i used a flashlight, a little mirror and right angled snap ring pliers. it got a little frustrating to get it off.
-after that you will need to pry the pulley off the compressor. i used a big crowbar and hit it with a dead blow hammer until it popped off.

when i got the pulley off it was pretty easy to tell that was where the noise was coming from. i could barely turn the bearing with my fingers.

then you just need to press the old bearing out of the pulley with a vice and a big socket. the bearing itself was about $100 canadian at a local bearing supplier and took a couple of days to get it. my '04 used a nachi bearing part #30BG05S2G-2DS

i also replaced the tension pulley bearing at the same time even though it was ok. this bearing was $25.

toyota does not sell the bearing itself. the whole a/c clutch from toyota was going to be about $700 and most parts stores wanted somewhere around $500 if they could actually get it.

good luck

[Duke000088]

Hmm... interesting. Thanks for the walkthrough. Honestly, I'm not 100% sure it's the compressor vs. the clutch. The clutch engages... the A/C is functional... but as soon as the clutch engages the grinding noise starts up. I put a stethescope on the compressor and it was LOUD but to fair, noise from the clutch would easily be heard through the compressor.

I'm leaning towards a full swap just to be sure. I've seen compressor and clutch assemblies on RockAuto for around $450. What are some other sites to pick up Toyota parts?

Anymore input on disconnecting the A/C lines? Oil? I can turn bolts... it's the other stuff I'm worried about.

Thanks!

[Winch]

Removing the AC hoses from the compressor is a piece of cake. They are attached with only one small bolt each. Use a 10mm socket or wrench and then gently wiggle the line off so as not to damage the O-ring. You don't need special tools for this. Sorry can't help with the other questions.

[Kyota]

Special oils or aything? I doubt it. I had to replace the condenser on my truck a few years ago cause I got in a accident. I pulled off the bend up one. Covered the ends. 2 months later when I installed the new (used) one, I just put it back on and screwed it reasonbly tight. My gramps had a vacuum pump and he knew about recharging AC systems so he helped me charge it with R134A, I recall.

BUT....I did not remove the compressor.

[Duke000088]

I've been reading the FSM on how to do this.

Why do I have to remove the power steering belt to remove the A/C compressor? Do they share a pulley?

Do I need any special tools for this job? For example, do I need something special to keep the idler pulley from spinning while I loosen the nut on it?

$420 for a reman unit at NAPA... yikes! At least it came with the clutch.

[steve604]

Originally Posted by Duke000088

Why do I have to remove the power steering belt to remove the A/C compressor? Do they share a pulley?

yes. if you are just going to remove the compressor and install another at the same time then you don't need to bother with removing the p/s belt. i pulled it off so i could completely remove the a/c so i could drive without it.

Originally Posted by Duke000088

Do I need any special tools for this job? For example, do I need something special to keep the idler pulley from spinning while I loosen the nut on it?

the idler pulley will not spin with the nut.

[Popperman63]

Originally Posted by Duke000088

Why do I have to remove the power steering belt to remove the A/C compressor? Do they share a pulley?

The power steering belt is in front of the A/C belt on the pulley where they connect to the crankshaft. Don't worry, It is easier to remove than the A/C belt is. It's right there up top.

[rugerm44]

It wouldnt hurt to flush the lines and condenser and put on a new reciever dryer.If the comp has spit up parts into the system it could damage the new one.Do a google search for ac service.Mastercool has a good website along with a very good book on automotive ac systems and how to service them.Time well spent.You can pickup a few cheap tools at harbour freight or have it serviced after you install it yourself.Probably cheaper to take it to a shop to get it charged up.If you want to do it yourself stay a way from the air powered vaccum pumps and get an electric one.

[kigmob]

I just replaced my whole compressor. Got a denso one (toyota uses denso a/c compressors) here. Real good price. http://www.amazon.com/Denso-471-1223...6260930&sr=1-7

[steve604]

you can clearly hear the sound from my bad pulley bearing on the compressor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEUmhtfSdNA

i spent $100 and less than 1 hour to fix it without removing the compressor or evacuating the system

[jski]

Ok, were it me, before I started trying to replace the A/C compressor I would be checking the bearings.

There are two possible bearing that could be bad. I would start with the easy one; the tensioner.

I would take the tensioner off and check it for mud or debris inside and check to see if the bearing is any good. If it is bad, replace it and put the belt back on. See if it fixed your noise issue.

If that checks out, pull the belt again and then pull the clutch on the compressor without taking any A/C hoses apart. Check to see if the clutch bearings are bad. If they are, replace the bearing or the clutch assembly and try again.

If you still need to replace the compressor, you will need to have refrigerant recovered by a shop first. The hoses unbolt from the compressor and pull straight out. The compressor itself is held in by four long bolts. You don't mention if this is a 4 or 6 cylinder engine, but on my 3RZ, I was able to get the compressor in and out from the top without any trouble. All I had to do was disconnect one hose from the airbox to make some room. Try to keep the compressor upright so you don't spill the oil out of it.

The new compressor will probably ship without oil in it or with instructions to replace the oil in it with the proper oil for your application. Take the old compressor and drain the old oil out of it. Turn the compressor hub by hand a few times to get it all out. Measure how much you got. You will need to put the same amount of new oil in the new compressor.

Since the system has been opened, you should also be replacing the dryer. It is so cheap that there really is no excuse to leave the old one in place. Again, check to see how much oil is in the dryer and add the same amount of new oil to the new dryer.

Toyota used Denso ND-8 oil, but that may be hard to find. Don't worry, it is the same as PAG-46 which you can get almost anywhere.

Put in the oil, put all the parts back together. Use new o-rings on the compressor and dryer (do the dryer last to minimize exposure to the air) and turn the compressor hub a few times by hand to get the liquid oil through the compressor before the engine spins it. This will prevent slugging the new compressor. Now have a shop evacuate and charge the system.

If you want to do that yourself, then you will need a vacuum pump, a gauge set, and some refrigerant. Harbor freight has a gauge set for about $50 and a vacuum pump for about $90... less if they are on sale.

For refrigerant, get the plain old R-134a. Don't get anything with leak stoppers or oil added or refrigerant boosters. They all cause other problems eventually.

Hook everything up, pull a vacuum and make sure it holds. If it does, charge two 12oz cans into the system. You will have to charge the second can off-idle or you won't get it all in. That should be it.

Two cans is technically 24oz of refrigerant. The Tacoma takes 19-23oz. Since you never get it all out of the cans or lines, you loose about 3-4oz. That puts us right at 20-21oz in the system. As good as you or most shops will get.

[Duke000088]

Wow - great responses. Thanks to everyone.

To fill in a few blanks: It's a V6 2002. Also, I'm suspect a bad compressor because it only makes a grinding noise when the A/C engages... it's dead quiet when the A/C cycles OFF. So, for that reason I do not suspect the tensioner is the culprit. That probably doesn't entirely rule out a bad clutch but at this point I'm committed to swapping the compressor.

I started last night. I suck. One of the bolts of the skid plate was rounded off. But it finally gave in to a Bolt-Out after a while.

Here's the big question fo the day: How the hell does that compressor come out??? Holy cow - am I supposed to drop it DOWN between the crossmember and the radiator? Power steering hard lines are in the way... suppose I could move them.

Someone above mentioned pull it UP and out from the top. Really?? That compressor just seems SO HUGE compared to either escape route. I'm seriously questioning whether I know what the hell I'm doing!

So... V6... A/C compressor comes down and out or goes up and out? Please help!

Thanks everyone!

[Duke000088]

Well, I got the old compressor out. I took the airbox and power steering pump out. The A/C tensioner bolt snapped (lovely) so I also removed the A/C compressor bracket so I could remove the stub of the broken bolt and setup for a replacement.

From what I could tell the old compressor didn't have any oil in it. Maybe a 20 drops.

I clearly need to swap the top plate with the pressure inlets for the hoses from the old to the new compressor. But does anyone know the proper torque on the four bolts that hold the plate on? I didn't catch that in the FSM. There is also a rubber gasket that had to be transferred over from the old to the new.

Off to the dealership in the morning to grab a few bolts and gaskets (power steering high pressure hose). Then hopefully reassembly.

[jski]

There was almost no oil in the old compressor? You did turn the hub (not the pulley) by hand to get whatever was in the pistons out, right?

If so, I think you may have found what killed the old compressor.

The oil in the A/C system is there for the compressor. The 10PA series compressors that are in the Tacoma need 229cc (7.75oz) of oil. The Toyota service specifications list how much oil to put back into the system for the receiver (20cc), condenser (40cc), and the evaporator (40cc). I find it curious that they don't mention the same for the compressor... odd.

Other than the compressor, these are the components that can hold any appreciable amount of oil. All that is left are hoses, which won't hold enough to worry about. If you total up the amounts that the manual mentions you get 100cc or about half the total required oil charge. There should have been at least 100cc or so of oil coming out of that old compressor.

It sounds to me like someone either replaced the compressor before and didn't put any oil in it, or at some point the system dumped its total charge (e.g. blew a line) and no one put any oil back into it.

If the compressor really was running without oil and you caught it before it started blowing debris into the system, you got lucky. If it had you would probably be replacing your condenser as well. You absolutely should be replacing your dryer now. It isn't the best filter, but it does catch some stuff that would clog your expansion valve. I would measure what comes out of the dryer and compare that to how much oil Toyota says a dryer should hold.

So, where are we now? We have a new dry compressor and a new dry dryer. If this were a perfect system, that leaves us with 80cc of oil or so in the system. Without pulling all the other parts and draining it all out, you will never know for sure just how much oil is in there. Since that is probably more work than it is worth and a little more oil is better than not enough, we will assume that the system is empty.

I would put about 129cc of oil into the inlet side of the compressor (the bigger port) and the remaining 100cc of oil into the new dryer. Once that is all together, turn the compressor hub by hand a few times to get the oil through the compressor, then charge.

If you feel that there is still some oil in the lines and other parts, you can go a little lighter on the oil in the dryer... maybe 80cc instead of 100cc. Unfortunately, you kind of have to make an educated guess as to how dry the system was. How much of a mess did it make when you pulled hoses? How much oil came out of the dryer?

The compressor needs oil no matter what and all service procedures I have read say that you need at least 60-100cc of oil in the compressor, so there is your starting point.

[Duke000088]

Great info regarding the oil... Yeah, I was stunned when I tipped the old compressor upside down and maybe 20 drops came out. When I pulled the lines there was no significant amount of oil loss (the fittings were "wet" with oil but that's it). I have not yet checked the dryer for oil content (will do).

The compressor appears to be original. However, my wife did lose A/C last year and it was driveway charged with cans... it probably lost the oil then.

My new compressor from NAPA appears to have some oil in it (I can see it on the pre-chamber). I think I'll spill, catch, and measure it. Then add it back or add fresh oil (I bought some).

My main concern right now is the suction/discharge manifold. My new NAPA compressor did not come with one (the plate with the ports for the hoses). I assume I'm supposed to transfer the old manifold to the new compressor... it fits fine... there's also a rubber gasket involved... but I don't know what to torque the bolts to. It's a high pressure situation so IT WILL MATTER. I just spoke with a Toyota parts guy and it was stunned that the reman compressor did not come with the manifold plate... it raised some doubt that I have my ducks lined up.

Has anyone replaced with a reman compressor? Did the manifold (ports for the hoses) come already attached?? I'm really stuck on this...

[jski]

Ah, the manifold plate... That one part alone gave me no end of trouble when gathering parts to install the A/C in my Tacoma.

As you have discovered, most compressors you can buy come without that little plate. Everyone expects you to take the part off your old compressor. In my case, I didn't have an old compressor to work with and no one seems to have the manifolds for sale. I ended up getting a used compressor for $50. I figured it was worth it for the manifold and clutch even if the compressor was bad. The compressor was perfect, so I installed the whole thing.

The reason that most compressors don't come with the manifold plate is that it and the clutch are the only parts that make a compressor fit a specific vehicle. As an example, just about every Toyota out there is running the same Denso compressor. Some have hoses that exit to the right, and some to the left. Some have v-belt pulleys and some have multi-groove pulleys. The only things that makes the compressor in my 4 cylinder Tacoma different than the compressor in a 1992 Acura NSX are the manifold plate and clutch. Actually, for that application, it may only be the manifold plate. I would have to check which of the half-dozen or so clutches it used.

The compressor houses can stock six configurations of compressor and fit everything that ever used a 10PA series compressor.

I did some looking and from multiple sources it appears that the torque spec for the manifold plate bolts on Denso compressors is 15 ft-lbs. It wasn't easy to find though. I found it deep in a document for refitting Audi systems from R-12 to R-134a. For some reason they were changing manifold plates and there were the numbers.

I wouldn't reuse the oil that the compressor shipped with. Often it is mineral oil which is great for the compressor in manufacturing and shipping but won't work with R-134a. If it is a PAG or POE oil you have no idea how long it has been exposed to the air and both will absorb moisture and go bad. I would dump it out and use fresh PAG oil in there. If you can get it the "double ended" or "capped" PAG oils are much better about moisture than the older stuff.

[Duke000088]

Well that might be the final piece of the puzzle... thanks. I'm going to drain and replace the oil, swap on the gasket and manifold plate and bolt it on to 15ftlb. I'm waiting on a couple odds and ends (new tensioner pulley; new tensioner bolt) from Toyota. Hopefully I can bolt it all back together before the weekend.

Thanks for the help!

[zidaro]

this thread damn near ought to be in the FAQ's. Very nice info, thanks

[Interex]

A/C Compressor guide from the FSM:

Components
On-vehicle Inspection
Removal
Disassembly
Reassembly
Installation

[Duke000088]

The FSM is good overall but is noticeably lacking on the manifold plate. I mean, it's kind of a no-brainer to swap it over but I still got a little worried since this is my first time. To compound my worry, my local Toyota dealer parts guy was like, "Whoa! Swap the inlet ports? That doesn't sound right... you probably have the wrong part."

Yeah, no.

Thankfully I got some good info from Ttora. My tensioner bolt and other pieces are in and reassembly starts tonight!

[steve604]

they probably don't mention it in the fsm because it's designed for toyota techs using orginal toyota parts. the compressor you buy from toyota will have the proper manifold plate.

[Duke000088]

Originally Posted by steve604

they probably don't mention it in the fsm because it's designed for toyota techs using orginal toyota parts. the compressor you buy from toyota will have the proper manifold plate.

True.

I'll shift blame over to the compressor manufacturer for not providing a note about it. All is well, so i can't complain. I got the new compressor installed, re-put the power steering back in and am just about ready to fire it all up.

Oops - no, I still have to change out the drier.

Gotta bleed the power steering and double check the belt tensions.

My mini conundrum is that I realized that the power steering fluid that came out of the pump was NOT DexIII ATF. This is my wife's Tacoma that has recently fallen under my jurisdiction... she's been taking it to JiffyLube (gasp) for years. They've been putting in regular power steering fluid... it appears as slightly amber. Gotta love it.

I'm debating doing a full purge (drain/refill/drain/refill) now or just topping off and bleeding with "regular" P/S fluid. I want to get the sucker back on the road!

[jski]

Well, how did it go? Did you get it all back together? Did it work? Inquiring minds want to know.

[Duke000088]

Originally Posted by jski

Well, how did it go? Did you get it all back together? Did it work? Inquiring minds want to know.

Yes!

Bolted up the bracket (had to replace the A/C pulley tensioner bolt), oiled and bolted in the new compressor, bolted on the power steering pump, installed the new drier and o-rings, refit the belts, refit the airbox, bled the power steering, and fired it all up. We just got it recharged the other night and it's working awesome! The clutch seems to be kicking on no problem... no leaks... blows cold... and best of all no "harbinger of death" whine from the compressor. Just smooth as silk.

We saved a good chunk of change on that job. Many thanks to jski and others for all the excellent information. Good good stuff.

[jski]

That is what we like to hear.

You have successfully tackled what is probably the most intimidating repair for the home mechanic next to rebuilding transmissions.

I am sure the wife was wondering if this was a good idea all through the project, especially when half the parts for her truck were no longer under the hood. She probably had the number of a shop on mental speed dial for when it all went wrong. Now that you have it all fixed, you are a certifiable genius.

Enjoy your cold air and the benefits of being a genius!

[Starman97]

Congrats on the AC job, my 1st one was on a Supra, dumb tech put R134 into an R12 system. Ate every O-ring in the system.

I redid my Tacoma's, compressor was leaking at the mainseal, at least the rebuild shop I use keeps the mounting plate when they do a compressor, so I did not have to wonder about that.
I did buy an electric vacuum pump and a set of gauges, they paid for themselves already. I also did my RV, changed it over from R12 to R152a.

Now that you have it running, de-grease all the fittings and hose connectors and watch them for oil, you may still have a leak in the system. AC shops have electronic sniffers that can detect very slow leaks, might be worth a check.

PS fluid, I looked into it, I'm using Mobil-1 ATF, it's hydraulic fluid and it exceeds the specs for any P/S application. I've been running it for a year now in the trans and P/S, nice and quiet, no leaks in my '95.